treemandan
Tree Freak
So I bought a house in the sticks that had trees towering all around with mold problems, moisture all around, no sunlight, no wind, branches and debris dropping on the roof. Trees cracking in the ice/snow storms, hanging over the house, making us sleep in the basement. Enough was enough. I posted here couple years ago looking for prices. Got two quotes by local guys. One quote was over $11,000 and the other quote was $9600 for taking about 25 trees down (more than originally planned) , removing the wood and grinding 3 stumps that were in the middle of the yard. Most trees were white pine over 75' tall and about 5-6 would have to be cut piece by piece by climbing and rigging the trees. Possibly more money for lowering power lines for one day.
Even though I could afford to have them do it, after a year I decided that this could not be all that difficult and it would take me no more than couple weekends. Boy was I wrong. I watched hundreds of youtube videos, bought some books, then bought climbing gear, ropes, partawrap, blocks, winches, 3 chainsaws. Total about $1000 from SherillTree. It all looked so easy.
Never cut a single tree down in my life, living in the city, working desk job, but being an engineer I though, hey it's all about mass and center of gravity. This was a first tree I dropped. It was a heavy leaner but it was the only tree leaning away from my house. I wrapped some extra rope near my cut in case of barber chairs. Got a perfect hinge on my first tree.
Unfortunately, this was the only tree leaning away as all others were going towards the sun growing over my house. It was time to start climbing. Had to use my bicycle helmet but bought proper helmet the next week. Climbed, rigged and lowered 3 trees. Wife helped working the portawrap. First climb.
Removing the stumps was more work than cutting down the trees. I had to dig around, expose as much of the stump as possible, and just keep on cutting, Lots of sharpening with rocks all around. This was a monster pine. It took me 15 hours just to get this thing 6" below the ground level. Could do it in couple hours with stump grinder but noooo. Had to do it my self with chain saw and shovel.
I have a wood stove so picked up electric log splitter last year from Craigslist for $100. This thing splits everything and keeps on smiling. No more paying for wood. It's pine but it's free. Just have to clean my chimney more often as I try to make the pine burn as long as possible.
So last winter I took 6 trees down, split and stacked and I burned about half of it by now. Warm winter. This winter I had to finish this job. With no snow on the ground I started in January and just finished it. Had to climb another 3 trees and rigged a zip line to move the cut sections away from the 10000 volts power lines. Then dropped about 20 trees by climbing 3/4 way up, installing the ropes, using two 5 ton manual winches I placed the trees exactly where I wanted them. On the east side of my house I had only one place to drop the trees. Had a house, power lines, driveway, septic, leaving only one area. But even there I had to watch out for my stacked wood pile. With lots of winching and cutting and winching I dropped about 15 trees all in the same spot even though they were leaning towards my house or the power lines.
Rigging the trees.
The pile up.
Just finished slicing everything this weekend. I have another pile like that on the west side of the house. This wood will last me at least another 5 seasons. $5000 savings on top of $9600 I didn't spend.
This whole project was a toughest thing I ever had to do. I never once got hurt but I can see how easy it is to get in trouble being 80' in the air, running a chain saw, having branches and logs swing around. I know I could have done the job in half the time, but I always had extra ropes, extra tie ins, checking everything twice, looking at every branch for minutes trying to figure out how it's going to swing, where it's going to fall.
The physical part of the climbing was kicking my .... I have been a gym rat my whole life, also a triathlete where I race 4-5 races pear year and training almost everyday. I had pains I never felt before, My hands and arms were numb, blisters from ropes, my legs all bruised up from tree gaffs. But I'm glad I did it. Now I help others (for free) that have trees to remove and enjoy being up in the trees but I'll keep my desk job. I could never do this 8-10 hours a day. Just being up in a tree for 2 hours wears me down. You guys are tough cookies for sure.
The wife is going : for #### sake just get this mess cleaned up, I dunno why you have to be out here screwing around with this, why did I marry a crazy man?, I'm going shopping for blinds".
